meow

Sunday, June 29, 2008

It's oh so quiet, shhhh, shhhhh

Mmmm....an uneventful weekend. And haven't had the weepies since Thursday. Yipee! Friday night was a movie & hanging out with Grace. Saturday was weekend errands & hanging out with the neighbors. Today was bumming around Harvard Square & hanging out with Jess more.

I've been missing my girls back home & all over the country something fierce lately but am super fortunate to have one of my close friends living next door right now. Jess is just such an amazing & inspiring person. And Michael is proof that there are good guys out there. And them together show me that normal, happy marriages exist. I really do feel so cheesy saying this but thank goodness that through some random act of the apartment world I ended up moving into this apartment. It's like living in the dorms in college 'hey, wanna go get some food or cook dinner?' but we actually have more than $20 to our name so we can like actually do stuff that doesn't involve kegs.

Got everything done tonight earlier than expected. Last week I did a nice, thorough cleaning of the apartment on Monday afternoon, all laundry (save a couple inconsequential items) done and put away, cat litter=clean, dishes=done and it all feels good. It's nice going into a new week with the feeling that nothing's lagging in the chore department. Just a bath & trashy mag tonight & a half of a Parisian sammich & some potato salad from Cardullo's.

My newer camera broke pretty much as soon as I landed in Louisiana & through the grace of camera gods my older one magically worked again. For about a day. And I realized that infinite wisdom urged me to misplace/lose the cord that hooks up my computer to the camera to download them so I think this is the universe's way of just saying that I should go back to film.

So my dear interwebs boyfriend, today I did have some drama. When I was tying my hair back & looking for a cute ribbon to put in it, I could only find my green one! What happened to the yellow ones? Or the gray ones? HAS SOMEONE BEEN BREAKING INTO MY APARTMENT & STEALING MY RIBBONS?!?!?! It couldn't be anything else (yes, it could). I'd really like some closure on this ribbon issue. Thanks!

Next weekend is birthday weekend. I turn 29 so according to many, I have one more good year to find a husband. I find this hard to believe since I just keep getting hotter or maybe that's my mind going. Hhmmmm.....

Anyways, since I know uh, like 2 guys in Boston & one of them is leaving to shoot a movie on Saturday, it's going to be a girlie celebration. But what should I wear? We're going for tapas on Saturday afternoon. Is it too presumptuous or cliche to wear my pretty bcbg tutu dress & a tiara? Should I wear my skinny jeans (it's official....they're fitting comfortably again!!!)? Should I bust out my 'birthday dress'? (birthday dress does not equal birthday suit...it is an actual dress that I've worn several birthdays for the past 6 years)

Thursday, June 19, 2008

As Is

Sent out a 354 page grant today. One down, one more to go....at least in the next month. It's a strange feeling putting one of those together. You take pieces of this & pieces of that & put it all in order & make it look as pretty as possible & match the headers & footers & send it down to someone for them to tell you what needs to be changed, what's missing, what was done incorrectly. And then you make the corrections, usually at the last minute since like pregnancy, this takes a while before a product is final. And then you paginate it and make copies and tie it up with rubber bands and send it to the NIH.

When I looked at the clock & it said 5:20 when I got back to the office I realized that in order to make T's going away party downtown & then make it back out for dinner with Jen that it'd be about an hour & a half of commuting, a tapa and no time to relax by the time I made it back to Allston. So I bowed out of tapas & decided to walk towards home. Up Longwood & Seawall & Kent. There are a few gifts for me to wrap for the weekend so stopping by Paper Source killed 2 birds with one stone. Or more like 3: a chance to breathe, get an errand done & exercise.

At Paper Source I found some cute reusable bags & paper flowers to make. The cashier & I talked about how great the movie Mary Poppins is. Very nice trip with a shining sun and nice temperature.

Heading from Coolidge Corner up Harvard St there was an obvious to do since the street had been closed off. For a busy intersection, this was a problem. Heading north past the booksmith and coffee shops the streets were bare other than for emergency vehicles and police officers. A few paces more and to my left I saw what can best be described as a singed sedan carcass and people milling in front of me.

A red haired woman told me that the street was blocked off & we needed to go around the alley way. She had two red haired kids, a boy and a girl, with her. I asked her if she knew what had happened. She said that a man was driving a van and had a heart attack, was going insanely fast down Harvard St unconscious ran into a parked car and another car and another car, which at least one instantly burst into flames. This happened around 5:30.

Naturally responding, do you know if anyone was hurt, which I obviously knew the answer but was a bit shocked at the news. She said that they saw a child being pulled from a car. My throat began to tense.

We turned into the alley way and the little girl asked my name. I held out my hand and said 'emily, and what is your name?'. She also stuck out her hand for me to shake it and said 'Lily'. 'Well, it's a pleasure to meet you Lily. And who is this?', I asked the little boy. 'Max'. They both smiled at me and I introduced myself to their mom. Lily told me that they had been in school when it happened and a few paces we parted ways but Lily skipped along side me and asked whether I was going home. I said I was meeting a friend for dinner and asked if she was going home. She said that they needed to pick up things from school still. (Their mother had left their things there to calm her children with lemonades.) Eve, their mom, had called to Lily and I said it was nice to meet her.

Past the park with all of the kids swinging on swings, I called Jaimie. She asked how it was going and I started to describe the accident and began crying. Tears uncontrollably streaming down my face. How the accident really wouldn't affect my life but how powerful it was to be around the scene and how then I met these two beautiful children and how Lily was so polite and wanted to ask so many questions and I just wanted to pick her up and hug her and tell her how precious she was. I have no idea why that had come over me nor did I act on it. But how incredibly bittersweet the experience was and just how bittersweet life has been lately.

And then I thought about walking into the scene of a tragic accident and how even though a half hour before there were flames and chaos, people focused their energy on helping others. Even as simple as telling strangers that the road was closed to alleviate the congestion of a heavily traveled corner. And how open & sweet Lily was. Just asking away, hoping to hear stories or whatever I had to offer her.

When did we become so guarded? When did it become a bad thing to ask more questions & only hope for more stories? Yes, it's safer, but are we missing out on some really big, wonderful things by staying within our fences? Being safe? When was the last time we extended our hands to someone and smiled and asked what they were up to? Maybe that's just what that other person needed at the time. And their bitter became sweet again.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Perfect First Date

Dear Internets,

Since you said that you'd be my boyfriend, you could surprise me after ballet & take me here. Yeah, so what, it wouldn't be that much of a surprise now but in the last month I've had enough surprises lately & they've all sucked (except for the one when I put on a pair of pants on Sunday that I haven't fit into in like a year & guess what, they fit!).

What's that? You still think I'm pretty even when I'm demanding? Aw shucks.

But I'm feeling a bit more hmph than demanding right now because I found out another surprise. My grade to Exam #2.

Another C.

Surprise! You thought you did well! Ha ha, you lose!

At this point I just want to throw in the towel & drown in some ice cream but...Will. Not. Give. Up.

Except for tonight when I bury my face in my pillow & cry myself to sleep.

Monday, June 16, 2008

Blindsided

Sadly, there isn't too much exciting to report. Still studying, only not for the GRE anymore. There's one more test in the Environmental Public Health class. Still don't know how I did on last week's test & don't really care at this point since I'm so deflated from taking tests & working & having a broken heart (fact: I totally care but feel too tired to). The GREs were a little bit of a disappointment but hopefully I won't have to take them again. I totally rocked the math but apparently turned into a complete idiot on the verbal. Well, I guess not a complete idiot but didn't do as well as I'd hoped.

Boo.

I got a serious case of the misses this weekend. Like missing coming home & telling someone about the day & hearing about theirs. George & Henry are a poor substitute since they only respond in meows. And knowing that Weeds was on tonight & I'd be watching it with a frozen pizza. And then last week I started crying in the food court because I wanted a shrimp tempura roll & was like 'wah, Ethan & I used to get shrimp tempura rolls all the time'. Pitiful.

Dear internet, will you be my boyfriend?

Well, too bad, you're going to be.

So I didn't write about this because, well, wasn't sure what I wanted to divulge (see?! why couldn't DIVULGE be on the GRE?) too much about the situation but here goes. I've been dying to talk about a work situation for like 2 weeks now & can't keep it in anymore.

One of the members on our 'team' is going to be out on maternity leave (yay baby!) &, well, let's call her, um, Molly, yeah, Molly! Anyways, Molly does a LOT around the office & has a really heavy workload but handles it because she's awesome & has been there for a few years now so she has her stuff together. In the absence of Molly we don't really have anyone to do her work (although obviously, it'll still be handled) & I'm happy to pick up some of it but the other team member is totally swamped. Like Everglades swamped. So we hired someone to handle some of Molly's stuff while she's out. This girl who we hired, we'll call her, Hoo Wee. Hoo Wee has a ton of experience & so we were like 'yay hoo wee's coming to work with us & she's awesome'. We had to wait like 6 weeks for Hoo Wee to give her notice & come over to our place of work.

On a side note, during her interview, Hoo Wee's phone went off twice which the first time I was like 'whatevs' but then the second time was like 'uh, turn your phone off, you're in an interview but again whatevs'.

So finally it's Hoo Wee's first day & we're all so excited to welcome her onto the team & that there'd be another person working with us. So Hoo Wee shows up & pretty much has a major freak attack the first day because she doesn't have a parking spot. On a side note, I work in an area where parking spots are not only rare & reserved for patients (duh!) but that they're like as much as my first apartment's rent. Hoo Wee started her working but just kept coming back to this parking spot.

Parking spot this. Parking spot that. Deal-breaker.

A couple days go by & we figured that the whole parking spot thing would be done & over. Nope. Still kept on the phone like half of the day trying to find a parking spot.

At the end of Day 4 of working she gave her notice.

Over a parking spot.

No joke.

People are getting laid off left & right & this girl quit because of a parking spot. Can you believe that? Yeah, me neither! Was like 'i thought it was part of my package'. Uh, brainiac MD/PhDs who are working directly on CURING CANCER don't get parking spots until they're pretty much tenured.

We were all pretty much floored.

So that's the major dish of the last couple weeks. Did you enjoy it internet? How was your day? Want to watch a movie & cuddle?

Jez, I need more friends. Stat.

At least I made it back into the studio this week & start pointe class in 2 weeks, which will bump up studio time to like 5 hours/week just for ballet.

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

All Things Considered

Today's better than yesterday, which was better than Friday. This weekend doesn't count because a.) it's a weekend & b.) it was a weekend filled with some pretty bad thoughts. Stupid stuff that you get like 3 weeks after breaking up. Which even though right now haunt me a little & it sucks, maybe that means I've moved on to Stage 2 or whatever.

After Pete & I broke up, I slept on the couch for a week straight without even touching my bed. And then slowly it took about a month to get to the point that I could fall asleep in bed without first on the couch without the help of Advil PM or other heavy sedation (Alex, what is a television?). It's 2 days into Week 3 from the break up with Ethan & I'm still falling asleep on the couch most nights but making it into my bed by about 1 a.m., which is an improvement from last week, which was more like 4 a.m.-5 a.m. Tonight's plan was to get home from my second Public Health test, that I've convinced myself that I failed so that if I really did fail I won't feel so bad since last time I thought I did pretty well & got a terrible grade, & study more for the GRE. That's not happening. It's like 90 degrees here & my brain has turned into mush.

It's like freaking August in Boston right now & everything's sticky so I'd really rather just sleep standing up like a cow (which is kind of what I feel like right now from heat bloat) or maybe I'll run a supercold bath & try to fall asleep in there.

Prune City!

Tomorrow's the Scooperbowl. Technically, it's today, tomorrow & Thursday but hopefully I'll get there tomorrow. Have you heard about this?

Heaven!

So for tonight, I'm going to rest my brain-dead little head IN MY BED. Tomorrow's tutoring. Thursday's a practice test. Friday's a practice test. And then Saturday's the real life GRE. Which at this point, scares the shit out of me but figure that if I totally eff that up then I can take it again. No use not trying, eh?

Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Next Wednesday

Slipped on my shoes and I made my self look somewhat right Cause I Can’t be at home tonight.And I have no clue as to what I’m doing here ButLet me lie in your bed for a dayCause it’s a long way still until tomorrow

All my insecurities are breaking me up inside.You light another cigarette and my eyes are on fire.

Lightning strikes me only in wavesAnd I know that I’m safe for now But I know the rest is on its way.

Lightning strikes me only in waves.And I know that I’m safe for now But I know the rest is on its way.

I know it isn’t easy Living as the way I wanted.All this will pass because it’s only as the day is long.

Night Conversations

ugh the rageee lolme: yeah. i actually am feeling a bit better. you certainly helped with that:)Friend: really? i'm like mega tears haha better to get it out now than at workme: on my walk home i was feeling like i wanted to punch a sign. just felt so sajfiodaghi;ewaofje;oawifhiewaFriend: i ran my 3 miles faster than normal11:33 PM me: yeah. it is better to get it out now. let it all release. speaking of release, it's ciggy time again. will you be around in 3?11:34 PM Friend: yah11:39 PM me: i can see my front door from my porch. through the windows & down the hallway.11:40 PM and for the longest time i would hope to see ethan walk through that door. and throw his arms around me. and say 'baby, i want to work this out' 'you and me' 'us'11:41 PM so pretty much everyday since about october i kept hoping that would happen. and every time i saw him i'd hope the same thing. and it just made me so angry. and feel so hurt. that he would say 'you have a tent? why don't we go camping?'11:42 PM Friend: dangme: and then time would go by & we wouldn't. and i would get angry & start a fight. hoping maybe that would jar it out of him. and it obviously didn't.11:43 PM so i guess that with every day that goes by, it's one day closer to those hopes completely vanishing. they still pop up.Friend: yupme: one just did outside. but now i'm not expecting him to come through the door.11:44 PM and i sincerely don't think that he wanted to ruin my life or anything as ridiculously self-absorbed as that. No one is out to ruin your life. And if they sincerely are, then they need a hobby or something. and i think that maybe he thought it would change too. but you can't change a relationship like that without some extreme amount of compromise. it's like i said before....Friend: well it's too lateme: love is like communism.Friend: what he did is unforgivable and yeah men don't compromise11:45 PM because they are raised to think the world revolves around themme: in order for it to work, all parties involved must have an abundance of willingness. and even at that, it doesn't always mean that it will work.

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Morning Conversations

Hiya friend,

I caught an earlier bus this morning. And by caught, literally saw the bus & ran. It was pretty funny to onlookers no doubt.

How's the Tufts progress going along?

Ended up getting done with the book critique stuff after 9 last night so I hung out with Jess for about a half an hour & went to bed. (i.e. fall asleep on the couch to Seinfield) And then woke up at 1 a.m. to some CSI crap where some woman was raped & drowned & they had her picture on the teevee screen & only id'ed her as Jane Doe so then I didn't fall back asleep for at least another 2 hours & Henry decided that he & I needed to have a chat at like 6 a.m. this morning. It went something like this:

Henry: Meow (MOOOOOOOOOM)Me: SnoreHenry: Meow (MOOOOOOOOOM wake up)Me: Come here bear & snuggle.Henry: Meow Meow (NOOOOOOO MOOOOOOOOM)Me: Bear, mommy is very tired because she stayed up late last night afraid that someone was going to break into her apartment & rape & drown her & woke up at every single sound all night long, please lay down.George: Open mouth & let out squeak (You fool! You are making her not like you so she will soon love me more forever despite the fact that I do not leave her alone when she studies!)Henry: Meeeeoooooow (HUUUUUUUUUNGRYYYYYYYYYYY)Me: Jesus, fine, whatever.Roll out of bed, stumble into kitchen, feed cats, stumble back to bed.

In other Cat News, Henry and George have started sitting either between the shower curtains or half in the bathtub while I shower again. It's kind of weird but not like I feel like I'm being 'watched' or anything so that's cool. Henry has decided that he is, in fact, a stuffed animal & belongs under my arm. Georgie is a weird little bird & likes to lay between my Indian style legs on his back & purr while I scratch his belly while I study.

Speaking of studying….I got a C on my first test. This does NOT make me happy & I intend on figuring out, exactly, what happened. A C?!?! Double-ewe Tee Eff? Ugh. I feel like after the last few weeks that this makes me want to cry at work again. I was really hoping to ace that. And thought I did pretty well. But I bet that I totally bombed the multiple choice. That's my bet. Which would suck because, well, multiple choice? Bombing that?! Failure. That's what it comes down to. FAILURE. This just means that I'll have to concentrate more on the bold-faced words in the text. Also, dude, the beach is totes out for Sunday. Maybe next week. Hunkering down & studying is the MO this weekend. Thinking that my pal's music video premiere on Friday is out now, too. Oh well. Come July there'll be more time just not right now.

Ugh. This test grade just made it so that I could MAYBE get an A- in the class IF I get a 100% on the rest of the tests. Seriously, friend, I'd really like to just sit down & cry at this point.